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Can't See Cannes Because Of The 'Blindness'
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Brazillian director Fernando Meirelles' ‘Blindness’ is a great film. Not an exceptional one. It’s a little too cool and cerebral.
The film, which kicked off the Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday, is an allegory in the mode of ‘Animal Farm’ and ‘Lord of the Flies.’ Several victims of a mysterious plague of blindness are forced into “quarantine,” i.e. a concentration camp.
If you remember those novels from high school English, then you know what happens next. Things break down. People break rank. The worst parts of human nature break through.
One one side are a doctor (Mark Ruffalo) and his wife (Julianne Moore), who can still see but doesn’t tell. On the other is a dictatorial bartender (Gael Garcia Bernal) and his mean old man sidekick (Maury Chaykin), who has been blind since birth. So each side has its advantages. Floating somewhere in between is a man with an eye patch (Danny Glover), who tends to philosophize a lot.
So while the film is every bit as interesting and thought provoking as its precedents in literature -- and Jose Saramago's 1995 novel on which it is based, it shares their remote quality. I appreciate the deeper meaning and the commentary on the human condition, but that’s not enough. In order to be truly exceptional, a film needs to connect. Give me ‘E.T.’ anytime.
